More on Cook

We talked about the death of Cook and how Charles Clerke tried to get his bones back.
Clerke negotiated instead of kidnapping people to swap for what he wanted.
He didn’t seem to want the bodies of the five marines, just of Cook.

Cook’s body had been ceremoniously burnt and de-fleshed. His bones were prepared according to the Hawaiian tradition for people of great mana. Meanwhile, the British wanted to extend the same rights to him in their tradition. On the sad trip home, the men made a tiny coffin for his widow. A bit of his hair was put inside so she could have something of him to mourn over.

Here is more about this.

How do we look after the dead in our cultures?

China

A long time ago we burnt them. Sometimes we still do in some parts of China.
We will put them on a big coffin and carry them to a mountain and bury them.
Once a year, on the day they died, we go up the mountain and we put food and paper money and burn them so they  can have it in heaven.

South Africa

We burn them or put them in a coffin and bury them. We go to the church to pray and to say good bye.

Korea

If someone is dead we celebrate them. We pray for them. We say, “Please go to Heaven.” If they don’t go to church we don’t pray for them because they don’t believe in God. We give their family money to help them. On the person’s death day, we pray to them. We bow to them. We also bow to them on their birthday. We put food on the table for them (then we eat it ourselves). We throw wine on the grave (if they liked wine).

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